 But true love comes, not so lightlyWithout fear and with no doubting,We always fear that what we love may fail,So I don't dare to stir myself to speak. "Ab joi mou lo vers e·l comens", line 13; translation by James H. Donalson. [1]

 The melancholy science from which I make this offering to my friend relates to a region that from time immemorial was regarded as the true field of philosophy, but which, since the latter’s conversion into method, has lapsed into intellectual neglect, sententious whimsy and finally oblivion: the teaching of the good life. What the philosophers once knew as life has become the sphere of private existence and now of mere consumption, dragged along as an appendage of the process of material production, without autonomy or substance of its own.E. Jephcott, trans. (1974), Dedication

 Not from the heavy soilwhere blood and sex and oathrule in their hallowed might,where the earth itself,guarding the primal consecrated order,avenges wantonness and madness —not from the heavy soil of the earth,but from the spirit's choice and free desire, needing no oath of legal bond,is friend bestowed on friend.Variant translation:A friend is a gift to a friendnot from the heavy soil where blood andrace and oaths are mighty and holy,where the earth itself watches over the sacredhallowed and ancient ordinancesand defends and avenges them,not from the heavy soil of the earth,but from free choice and the free desireof the heart, which are not in need ofan oath or a law.As translated in A New Critique of Theoretical Thought (1953) by Herman Dooyeweerd, Vol. 3, p. 179

 The friends of peace in bourgeois circles believe that world peace and disarmament can be realised within the frame-work of the present social order, whereas we, who base ourselves on the materialistic conception of history and on scientific socialism, are convinced that militarism can only be abolished from the world with the destruction of the capitalist class state.

 Despite all its shortcomings, this Constitution looms against the background of Russo-Prusso-Austrian barbarism as the only work of liberty which Eastern Europe has ever created independently, and it emerged exclusively from the privileged class, from the nobility. The history of the world has never seen another example of such nobility of the nobility.On the Polish Constitution of May 3, 1791."Poland, Prussia and Russia" (1863 manuscript). In Werner Conze and Dieter Hertz-Eichenrode (ed.) Manuskripte über die polnische Frage (1863-1864). Hague: Mouton, 1961

 In these dancers of Saint John and Saint Vitus we can recognize the Bacchic choruses of the Greeks, with their prehistory in Asia Minor, as far back as Babylon and the orgiastic Sacaea. Some people, either through a lack of experience or through obtuseness, turn away with pity or contempt from phenomena such as these as from 'folk diseases', bolstered by a sense of their own sanity; these poor creatures have no idea how blighted and ghostly this 'sanity' of theirs sounds when the glowing life of Dionysiac revellers thunders past them.p. 17.

 In the end, those who were carried off early no longer need us:they are weaned from earth's sorrows and joys, and as gently as childrenoutgrow the soft breasts of their mothers. But we, who do needsuch great mysteries, we for whom grief is so oftenthe source of our spirit's growth — : could we exist without them?First Elegy (as translated by Stephen Mitchell)

 Dancing, the theatre, society, card-playing, games of chance, horses, women, drinking, traveling, and so on ... are not enough to ward off boredom where intellectual pleasures are rendered impossible by lack of intellectual needs. Thus a peculiar characteristic of the Philistine is a dull, dry seriousness akin to that of animals.E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, p. 344

 I feel the deepest veneration for the divine being, and therefore I am careful not to attribute to him unjust, fickle behavior, which would be condemned by the meanest mortal. Because of that, dear sister, I prefer not to believe that the almighty, benevolent being is at all concerned with human affairs. Rather I do attribute everything that happens to the living beings and certain effects of incalculable causes and I silently bow down before this being which is worthy of adoration, by admitting my ignorance concerning his ways, which his godly wisdom chose not to reveal.Letter to princess Amalie von Preußen

 True anarchy is the generative element of religion. Out of the annihilation of all existing institutions she raises her glorious head, as the new foundress of the world..English translation as quoted in The Dublin Review Vol. III (July-October 1837); The original German is quoted from the Fourth Leaflet of the White Rose (1942)Variant translation: True anarchy is the generative element of religion. Out of the annihilation of every positive element she lifts her gloriously radiant countenance as the founder of a new world..

 Out of infinite longings risefinite deeds like weak fountains,falling back just in time and trembling.And yet, what otherwise remains silent,our happy energies—show themselvesin these dancing tears.Initiale (Initial) (as translated by Cliff Crego)